


Book Club at the End of the World

by stifledlaughter



Category: Transformers: Prime
Genre: Huddling For Warmth, M/M, Metaphors, Unresolved Romantic Tension, enemies to... still enemies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-10-22
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:15:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27137162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stifledlaughter/pseuds/stifledlaughter
Summary: Megatron's head lolled back worryingly. It was so cold, and he was fading fast.With nothing else to be had, Optimus fell back on who he was at his core. A lover of stories, memory-keeping, and someone who believed in the strength of tales."I'm going to tell you a story, and you're going to listen," he said firmly, grabbing Megatron's shoulders and shaking them. The disgruntled clanking echoed as Megatron grumbled, but didn't protest aloud, which alarmed Optimus more than if he had.
Relationships: Megatron/Optimus Prime
Comments: 3
Kudos: 56





	Book Club at the End of the World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bmouse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bmouse/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Bmouse! I hope you like your gift - I tried to fit 2 fandoms into one fic, and I hope it hits the spot ^^  
> For anyone who isn't bmouse reading this - fun fact! I don't know Transformers fandom well, as I have only seen some episodes of TFP and read a little bit of fic. So if something seems amiss in the characterization, well, *gestures* I tried!  
> Thanks to my beta Purple, who patiently walked me through writing a Transformers fic as an author that doesn't actually know much about Transformers!

  
  


It was cold. It was dark. And judging by the dimming of Megatron's lights, it would just get darker, until there was only Optimus left.

To Optimus, that was not an option.

They'd been fighting in the base after the Decepticons had snuck in. He wasn’t sure if they’d just discovered how to get in, or if they’d been sitting on these plans for a while. Perhaps they were waiting for the right moment, or had found some other reason to delay. It wasn’t like they’d had the time to discuss it - it was chaos from the moment they made their appearance. 

Optimus hadn't even realized the experimental bridge to Cybertron that the Autobots been building had opened until he and Megatron careened through it and crashed into this cold, icy cave. It was likely Earth but nowhere near where the base was. The climate was vastly different, and Optimus could tell that few humans, if any, had ever been inside this inhospitable place since even he was nearing his limits. 

And Megatron had indeed surpassed his own- Optimus suspected that his heating regulator must have been damaged in their battle. Only his base systems were online, and even those were inching their way towards the final shutdown. 

Optimus shifted heat to his arm, draping it over Megatron's shoulders in hope that the metals of their chassises were conductive enough to transfer some over. In the few seconds when they had initially first landed, Megatron still tried to attack Optimus, but within moments the cold knocked them both to the floor - some with more force than others. 

_ This is not how your story ends _ , thought Optimus helplessly, watching as Megatron slumped further onto the floor, his metal frosting over and scraping against the rough rock floor of the cave. Optimus had no idea how their stories were supposed to end - ideally with Earth safe and the Decepticons leaving - but part of him always held out that Megatron could be changed, could be saved. 

"If you keep this up, your spark will go out," insisted Optimus, shaking Megatron as the other jerked forward, his biolights dimly flickering on and off like the tiny organic creatures that Optimus recalled seeing on Earth. 

When he had seen them, it had been a pleasant evening- at least, as pleasant as an evening during a war could be. A suspended false sense of hope that every day could end like this - watching the human children sprint about capturing the little bugs and then releasing them, little hands to the sky. He’d enjoyed the few minutes not thinking about battle strategies, or what had been lost. 

Or what they still had to lose. 

Optimus looked over at Megatron, whose EM field was flickering, but unlike seeing hope in those floating specks of light in the field being chased by the children, he saw shutdown. He saw death. He shifted closer and pulled Megatron close, willing more heat to his limbs.

"You - how dare- don’t presume to touch me, Prime!” snapped Megatron, and he tried to shove Optimus away, but even that was too much, and his lights dimmed further. 

"Don't waste your energy anymore," said Optimus, frantically thinking. How could he keep Megatron engaged until surely someone hit the button on that portal again, bringing them back? Given how often the children wandered into places they weren't supposed to and touched things, he estimated a fairly short time before any of them did just that. 

Megatron's head lolled back worryingly. It was so cold, and he was fading so fast. 

With nothing else to be had, Optimus fell back on who he was at his core. A lover of stories, memory-keeping, and someone who believed in the strength of tales. 

"I'm going to tell you a story, and you're going to listen," he said firmly, grabbing Megatron's shoulders and shaking them. The disgruntled clanking echoed as Megatron grumbled, but didn't protest aloud, which alarmed Optimus more than if he had.

He didn't know what story to choose as most of the childhood stories they were told as sparklings Megatron would know well and not be compelled to stay awake to hear. Searching his memory banks, his mind fell to the books that Jack had eagerly described to him during one of the peaceful times back at their base, and eventually Optimus had read on his own. He'd begun the first one and finished it within a day, deeply engrossed in the story. He’s read the others in the series as well, but it was that first one that had drawn him into that world. 

"This is the story of a warrior - rather, someone who would become a warrior - and his enemy, who was trying to conquer his home," said Optimus slowly, deciding to leave out the part where the main character was actually an Earth animal called a mouse and the enemy a rat. It had taken him a while when reading the book to adjust to the thought of a small mouse wielding a sword, but the story had been so compelling that he'd fallen easily back into the storyspace of belief once more. He was not sure that Megatron would take the whimsy of a tiny sword warrior as well as he did. "This is about to-be-warrior - Matthias - and the warlord Cluny the Scourge."

Megatron still looked completely uninterested, but at least his lights weren't completely dimmed, which was more than enough to work with. 

"Matthias was just another member of his community - an abbey called Redwall, which is -well, I won't go into it -" and Optimus saw Megatron's lights dim further, disengaged, and he hastily said, "Unimportant! Anyhow, he was just another member of his community when he eventually, after much trial and tribulation, found the sword he'd been seeking- a weapon that would give him strength and power imbued to him by the strongest warrior the abbey had ever had. He took this-"

"What did he do to deserve this?" mumbled Megatron, and Optimus startled. He hadn't actually thought that Megatron would engage with him on this.

"What do you mean?"

"Why did the sword choose him?" Megatron's lights were brighter than before, and his eyes glinted with distaste and anger. "You said it yourself. He was ordinary. He wasn't even a warrior to begin with. Probably never known the taste of battle, the way someone else might have. Like this Cluny fellow."

"Because he was brave, and because the sword saw the warrior he would become inside of him," said Optimus, and that's when he realized he'd perhaps chosen the wrong story. It was too close to home, too close to the bot next to him. A bot he'd once called his friend, until his own gifted - or was it forced, really?- destiny had taken that from him. Optimus shifted uncomfortably in his chassis, a form that had not always been his. 

"Did he change his name too?" asked Megatron, his voice bitter, echoing into the dark. His lights were bright and gaining clarity, in contrast to his sour voice, which pitched lower, angrier. "Like you did?"

"He did," said Optimus, hating how he'd worked himself into this without realizing it. But Megatron's lights weren't dimming anymore, and he only had to thank the story for keeping his processes alert and running. "But that's later in the story."

Megatron tried to shrug Optimus's arm off of his shoulders, but it was to no avail - he still didn't have enough energy to move the large weight off of him. "You don't have to keep doing this," he snapped, and Optimus flinched at the vitriol in his voice. "Why are you trying to keep my systems going? We're at war, you fool."

"I'm not done with the story," said Optimus, dodging the question, and Megatron's eyes flashed.  _ I know that you know that I'm avoiding answering you _ , thought Optimus.  _ Let's just stay in this storyspace here and pretend, for a moment, that we aren’t at war.  _ "Matthias returned from finding the sword and came to see his abbey under attack. He rushed in to do final battle with his foe, and eventually, in their duel, cut the rope holding the abbey's bell from above Cluny, crushing him in defeat. In his mentor's dying breaths, he was given the title 'The Warrior of Redwall'. In the end, his abbey prevailed, and they cast the army from their community in victory."

"So he finds this sword, gains this power, and then sweeps in and kills the warrior who had by his own right taken over this abbey? What soft, idealistic nonsense," scowled Megatron. "Drivel."

Optimus felt Megatron try to stand, and pressed down with his arm, shoving the other bot back to sitting. Megatron growled, "What do you think you're doing? I feel well enough to leave and escape your mindless rambling."

"You don't know what's outside this cave, and it's likely colder than in here," said Optimus. "Hardly strategic to die out there."

"Would rather die out there than in here with my enemy," said Megatron, his voice full of poison, and Optimus tried not to flinch. "Also don't tell me that you weren't trying to sway me with that story. The bell falling on Cluny? The abbey's own bell, its own infrastructure, being cast as a sacrifice and killing the invader? As if Earth could ever summon up that sort of power to defeat the Decepticons." 

"You seem awfully confident about that," said Optimus, but a flare of pride flickered in his core- the core that was once, at heart, a librarian and lover of stories. Even someone as far gone as Megatron, his body and mind ravaged by Dark Energon, still could find it in himself to analyze literature and come to the same conclusion Optimus had. 

As Megatron drew on more strength through his processes being activated, his ire increased. Optimus wondered if perhaps this is how it would end- arguing about literature in a cold, Earth cave away from armies and war. 

It seemed oddly easier, in the end, to what they had been doing. At least here, in the end of all things, it was just the two of them. No one else to watch the fall of two greats. They wouldn’t have to live up to that expectation of how the final battle would go down. 

There was silence for a few minutes, and then a loud creak as Megatron sat up, shifting. The frost that had begun to make spirals on his casing began to melt, and he glared at Optimus with smouldering fury in his eyes.

"You think just because you have the Matrix of Leadership, you get to command me to do whatever you please?" demanded Megatron, his voice dripping with disdain. “Our armies aren’t here with us but that doesn’t mean we are suddenly…  _ allies _ .”

“We’ve hashed this out for time eternal,” sighed Optimus, feeling the weight of ages on him. “Just… let me keep you from dying. You can fight me another day then.” 

Megatron looked like he was about to argue, but then fell back from where he’d leaned forward. He looked up at the ceiling, and Optimus wanted to believe that maybe, maybe, he’d gotten through to him. 

Megatron looked as if he was about to attack Optimus - sizing him up, leaning back as if to suddenly move to power forward. 

The final battle. 

How quiet. 

How cold. 

And then - 

Megatron fell back. His chassis clanked loudly, and he grunted, “Well? Tell me your foolish Earth stories. Keep me from dying until we get out of here, and I can fight you evenly again.” 

Optimus noticed that his arm was still on Megatron, despite the fact that Megatron probably had enough energy to shove it off fully now. Then again, perhaps Megatron had genuinely internally come to terms with the fact that if he did shove it off, he’d lose more heat, and then his systems would further shut down, cycling and cycling again. 

And so Optimus told him other stories- some from the same series, some from other books the children had brought to the base. Megatron kept somewhat engaged the entire time, despite his initial protests, and for a few minutes Optimus thought,  _ The end of all things, here, in this cold, talking about literature, is not the worst way to go.  _

Optimus was in the middle of telling another story with Megatron arguing about its dubious moral worthiness when there was a loud, shredding, shrieking sound that shattered the quiet of the cave. Megatron leapt up, and Optimus realized that he must have been at full strength for some time now to have reacted so quickly.

_ He really could have fought me for the past hour or so, couldn’t he? _

There was another howling shriek, and the same portal from earlier opened, yawning and wide. Megatron crowed. “Finally! My team must have gotten their wits about them-” 

There was a small voice that interrupted, yelling, “Optimus! Hurry!” It seemed that the children - as Optimus suspected they would- had found the portal button and reactivated it. He moved to rush through and realized that Megatron, if he didn’t move faster, would be left behind. As he leapt through, he saw Jack with his hand over the button, yelling, “Faster, I can close it so he’s stuck there!”

He knows he should have moved faster. He could have easily moved faster. It was in his power to do so. 

But he could not cut the bell rope. He could not let the bell fall. Not if it was in his power. 

He deliberately stumbled, and as Megatron rushed ahead of him, Optimus only then sped ahead as the portal sealed the cave, and their storyspace, behind them. 

  
  



End file.
